Dealing With the Eventual Collapse of Social Networks

taskforce writes "There are good reasons to think web services like Facebook won't be around forever. If Facebook ever were to go down there would be potentially huge costs to its users. We can all take individual steps to protect our data and social network, but is there anything we can do to our economy to mitigate the costs of the failure of these services? The Red Rock looks at the role open source, open standards, consumer cooperatives, and enterprise reform can play. The author concludes that all is not lost, and that there's a lot we can do to reduce both the cost and frequency of failure." His suggestions are pretty radical: "The first is draw up an Open Data Bill and pass it into law. This would (where applicable) mandate the use of open standards by firms, and also mandate that all data held about a user is downloadable by that user, in an open standard. ... The second is to reform the corporate structure of larger companies to include some directors elected by consumers, rather than just shareholders. Not all the directors, like in the Cooperative Group, and not even a majority, but just a small portion of the board — say one third."

Mod Points

[AndrewStephens]

Sometimes I wish Slashdot would let me download my mod points in an open format and use them on another web site. I have some Facebook posts in mind that need down-modding.

Re:backup your date to multisources

[Anonymous Coward]

Photos? My photos are on my hard drive.
I think what people are worried about is all the trinkets they've racked up in those social games.

Re:wow

[Black Parrot]

I guess I am the only person on the planet who never got a facebook account

Me too!

Hey - we should be friends, and maybe use the internet to keep track of what other like-minded people are doing.

Re:Friend-face

[azalin]

No need to worry, there are plenty of alternative ways to keep yourself from working. And if everything else fails, there is still solitaire.

Re:backup your date to multisources

[Chrisq]

There is one thing I have on facebook and nowhere else: contacts.

Of course, for family and friends I have their email address / phone number someplace else (namely Google) but there are quite a few "acquaintances" that I connect with exclusively on facebook / LinkedIn / etc.

Gosh, what a disaster it would be if you lost contact with the hundreds of "friends" you don't even know.